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“Could he have hired somebody?”

“He hired me to find his daughter.”

“What about her?”

“She’s on Staten Island with her mother, trying to hide from Lamming.”

“Come on.”

I followed Van Arc through the door and into a huge room that was almost the size of the entire house. I figured that the interior rooms had been gutted to make a viable workplace for the bodyguard staff. There were ten desks lined up for people who weren’t there.

“Where’s all the people work for Star Shield?” I asked Van Arc.

“Out workin’, I guess. That’s what the girl said.”

There was another door on the wall opposite the door we came through. He opened this portal and walked through. I followed.

There were two paramedics, a man and a woman, studying the remains of Paulie Antonucci Jr.

He was on his back mainly, propped up on his left shoulder as if maybe he had tried to rise and then died in that awkward position. There were two wounds to his chest; neither one had bled much. His right hand was bloody, not from clutching a wound but from receiving one. He was wearing a yellow, black, and red Hawaiian shirt, black trousers, and woven leather sandals over white cotton socks. There was a fragrant pile of vomit on top of his white desk.

The three-day shadow on his jaw had been stained by the vomit.

“The killer must’ve wanted something from him,” I said. “Maybe Paulie didn’t have an answer, or he was afraid that once he told the guy what he wanted that the interrogation would end like this.”

“Could be,” Van Arc allowed. “You have any idea what they wanted from him?”

“Same thing I wanted.”

“What’s that?”

“Where I could find Malto.”

The cop looked me over and then asked, “You armed?”

“No.”

“You mind if I see for myself?”

I raised my arms to the level of my ears.

35.

MURDER IN MIND, I knew what I had to do.

Making my way out to the Silver Lake district, I located an address on a street named Redcliff and rang a doorbell on the second floor of a chocolate-colored triplex of apartments. Getting no answer, I went back downstairs to sit in my car.

Leaf called but I didn’t answer. Five minutes later I texted her that I was busy and would call when I got a few minutes free. My daughter and grandmother, Olo and Gladstone, Leaf again, and some call that my phone labeled as Potential Spam hit me up. I didn’t answer any of them.

I called Arman Babylon’s cell phone, but it went straight to voicemail. Then I called through the hospital switchboard.

“Hello?”

“Ilsa?”

“Yes, Mr. Oliver.”

“Is he there?”